VR-driven startup Kalpnik Technologies raises seed funding

Kalpnik Technologies, a Bengaluru-based startup that uses technology such as virtual reality and augmented reality to provide immersive and interactive religious and spiritual experience, has raised a seed funding round.

The funding round was secured from a bunch of angel investors using an online platform Venture Catalysts. Some of the investors, who invested in the company include Ashwani Kakkar, chairman, board of directors at Via.com; United Group of Institutions chairman GG Gulati; Indus Homes CEO Bobby Reddy; Videonetics managing director Tinku Acharya; Everest Flavours owner Anand Ladsariya; Nitesh Prakash, senior director, Ola; and Nitin Agarwal, owner of NM Fashions and Devesh Agriexim.

Interestingly, the company’s product has not been released yet. As per the people aware of the development, the company is currently operating in stealth mode for over a year, but it is close to releasing its application for Android and iOS platforms.

Commenting on this matter, United Group of Institutions chairman GG Gulati, who invested in the startup, said,

Religion and spirituality play a significant role in the lives of Indians. But with devotees significantly outnumbering available shrines, the crowded complexes at popular places of worship and the sheer physical distance between the devotee’s city of residence and the location of the shrine can often be a deterrent to a fulfilling spiritual experience. Kalpnik uses cuttingedge technology to tackle this challenge and to provide devotees with an immersive spiritual experience, regardless of their physical locations.

The company has also applied to patent a technology that delivers object insertion and interactivity in 360-degree, virtual reality video streams, enabling a powerful viewing experience. This will enable devotees to recreate the experience of actually being physically present at the event, said one of the persons aware of the matter.

Kalpnik Technologies was founded by John Kuruvilla, who is a former managing director at GenNext Ventures, a Reliance Industries sponsored venture fund, along with Ashwani Garg, former director at Intel, and Apul Nahata, former chief technology officer at GenNext Ventures.